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Talk:Bear
Bear's Nationality The dog isn't Dutch, but German. Still a funny making mistake by American movies and TV series. Sorry, I am a Dutch person, so I'm from the Netherlands, so it is something that I'll notice right away. And of course, speaking Dutch is more difficult than speaking German for a lot of people. For 'Person of interest' it is funny to use German, because it is a language that people all over the world would recognize. Dutch words would probably a few people recognize. : I'm Dutch, but I think you should hear Finch make the commands (Val aan (attack) and ontspan (unwind, relax), for example), as he sounds a bit more genuine in Dutch than Reese, who has this crappy German-like way of pronouncing the commands. In one instance, he mocks Reese as Bear doesn't follow his commands at some point (beginning of an episode in Season 2). And for foreigners, Dutch and German sound pretty much the same. Not everybody is blessed with a talenknobbel ''('language bud' - Dutch for 'being proficient in (many) languages'). Therefore, the "inconsistencies" are 'okay' in my book. Logan Nugov (talk) 08:56, April 28, 2013 (UTC) :: Hi, Logan! The dog doesn't really have a nationality in the conventional sense. If anything, they're American (they use two) given they were bred in America and are owned by Americans, although both have names that seem Dutch to me. The U.S. military used these dogs for a variety of purposes, and it's true that they teach them to follow Dutch commands; I believe it's because there's no risk of them hearing the language spoken to/by anyone else, and know the commands are for them, but also so no one else but their handler can give them commands. :: In this case, the Dutch/German commands are for the camera; the dogs get commands by their handlers, who are off camera. I can't speak to how well either actor pronounces the Dutch, but make allowances for how little time Jim Caviezel had to learn the commands, and that he may not have an ear for languages. I'm sure it's frustrating, but I agree that it's really not all that important that the pronunciation is precise, as long as we get the point. --LeverageGuru (talk) 16:16, April 28, 2013 (UTC) ::: Sorry if my edit sounded sarcastic or anything, but I was merely replying to the person who posted the first alinea (who didn't even sign it). Yes, 'Midas van 't Rietje' is a 100% Dutch name, and yes, it seems true that military dogs (and police dogs - some US K9-squads seem to use French as commands, but I can't varify) are trained to follow foreign language commands to make sure they're "not corrumpted" (nobody from outside of the force can command them). And yes, they are trained to follow their actual masters' commands, and not the cast's, although they will eventually 'learn' to follow theirs as well (I have some experiences with dogs). And it's true that the Dutch commands are rarely heard apart from when Bear has to engage, although in my opinion, Finch has a near-perfect pronunciation. Nonetheless, Bear seems to 'understand' English just fine, with an air of irony.Logan Nugov (talk) 10:26, April 29, 2013 (UTC) :::: Not at all sarcastic, Logan, and I can tell you're knowledgeable about dogs! Although apologies; I responded to both paragraphs as though you'd written them. I've adjusted the indents so it's clear what's yours and what's the first person's comments. I had noticed Bear's ability to understand American English, but that's not entirely surprising given he was in the U.S. military. I'm guessing the Dutch was limited to activity when the dog is "on duty" so to speak. I knew nothing about this breed before the show introduced Bear. --LeverageGuru (talk) 14:57, April 29, 2013 (UTC) Dog actors According to this comment, Bear is not played by two dogs but solely by Graubaer's Boker. I removed the second name a while ago but I saw that it has been re-added. Do we have any reliable source that confirms either statement? While there are plenty of pages about Boker, there's almost no mentioning of Midas van't Rietje other than comments based on what TV Guide wrote. (The birthdate in Bear's infobox is Boker's real birthdate. It was probably a litte confusing but maybe we can put this in the Notes or Trivia section of the article.) Helloclaire (talk) 12:36, April 29, 2013 (UTC) : Uh-oh. That was me, and I added a source supporting the use of the two dogs, although I must confess, it struck me as pretty unusual that they'd need two. I believe Wikipedia uses it as well. How do we reconcile this? Your source is obviously one of the two dogs' owners via a message board, whereas mine is an external site on dog actors, which has a lot of information about Graubaer's Boker, and little on Midas van't Rietje. I can understand how the error(?) got into Wikipedia given its rather odd rules about blogs and primary sources, which results in some glaring errors, but we're not bound by that. I'm happy to adjust accordingly. I'll leave the site up until you have a chance to look at it. I'd leave the dog's birthdate in trivia, since we don't know that's actually Bear's birthdate, but that's a fairly minor matter. --LeverageGuru (talk) 15:04, April 29, 2013 (UTC) ::I assume the user who copied our character pages to WP also copied that particular piece of information and no other WP editor bothered to double check. I originally added both dogs when the Bear page was set up - back then this seemed to be legit. I've searched online for more sources but it's more or less like the one you named. The one I provided first (http://www.pedigreedatabase.com/german_shepherd_dog/bulletins.read?mnr=660681) is not available anymore. Is there anything in the closing credits of the episodes? Usually they would list animal actors, especially if they are prominently featured in the episode. It's not that unusual to have several animals playing the same part (I guess it's just like with babies) but since Bear only gets a few scenes per episode I also don't think they really need two dogs. Let's keep Graubaer's Boker as Bear's actor. If it turns out that they do use two dogs we can update the page and list more reliable sources. Helloclaire (talk) 15:58, April 29, 2013 (UTC) ::: WP's reliable source rule would rule out the discussion forum, which would leave them with the dog actor site; even if they did check, they'd only trust the external site. (You should see the war over an erroneous character name in the article about ''Elementary stemming from the same sourcing practices; some New Zealand newspaper is considered more reliable than CBS's media website for character names. Go figure.) ::: Anyway... I agree about keeping just the one dog. It makes more sense, there's far more information about him, and the external site, about which we know very little, may have picked up what was in TV Guide. They even took GB to NY Comic Con. There's nothing in the credits to help. Perhaps once the DVD comes out, we'll have better luck. Do you want to make the change? --LeverageGuru (talk) 16:11, April 29, 2013 (UTC) ::::The dogactors.com site might have even taken the information from our site, along with the picture of Bear (cf page version as of October 1, 2012). Anyway, I'll change it. Maybe someone can ask the producers next time there's a POI panel at a comic con. ::::As for reliable source rules.. I've thought about it before but I don't think the WP approach is suitable for fan wikis of TV shows, unless someone posts fan fiction. Especially the Original Research rule would eliminate like half of the content here and as long as a certain claim can be backed up with sources of the same background (in our case, fan forums), why make it more complicated than necessary. Helloclaire (talk) 06:12, April 30, 2013 (UTC)